Last week, the BBC (British Broadcasting Corp.) reported the letter of the mother of Anna Sebastian Perayil, an accountant at the accounting firm Ernst & Young (EY) in India who died four months after joining EY, about her daughter’s death that went viral on social media.
In her letter, she detailed the alleged “pressures her daughter had experienced at work, including working late into the night and on weekends, and appealed to EY ‘to reflect on its work culture’ and take steps to prioritize its employees’ health.”
EY denied the allegation and said Perayil was given work assignments like any other employees and that it did not believe work pressure was the cause of her demise.
Her death had given rise to discussions about employees being obliged to working extra hours out of passion or ambition, or under pressure by management, resulting in job burnout and diminished quality of life.
(Incidentally, if this happened in Japan, it would be described as a case of “karoshi” or death due to stress or mental anguish caused by overwork.)
This incident may have struck a chord with Filipino accountants who are recently employed or have been in the service for two to three years in accounting firms, and are tasked to review the financial statements of their clients.
It is common practice in accounting firms, law offices and other professional services companies that their newbies are assigned as many tasks as possible to test their competence or capacity for work during their probationary period.
These young professionals are often under pressure to strictly meet deadlines set by regulatory authorities without losing sight of the need for their work to meet the standards of their supervisors.
For accountants, the period of stress is highest on the days leading to the filing of income tax returns in April or the annual stockholders’ meeting of their clients where their audited financial statements have to be approved by the stockholders.
Thus, it is not uncommon for accountants to do all-nighters to finish their assignments. According to a former accountant of a large accounting firm, during crunch time, he and his same-level colleagues reported for work with bags that contained underwear and work clothes good for a week.
In light of the present tight employment situation in the country, young professionals are often willing to work beyond regular working hours, even to the extent of sacrificing time that should be spent for personal or wellness reasons, in order to keep their jobs or impress their bosses.
For them, the key to success, i.e., promotion or higher pay, is hard work and not to complain when they are given tasks that would require them to miss their meals, reduce their sleeping hours, or forgo social or family activities.
The pressure to be a workaholic becomes more acute if he or she has a family to take care of or is the source of financial assistance of his or her siblings and parents.
Because of tight business competition or the need to maximize profits with the lowest labor costs possible, work-life balance or maintaining a harmonious relationship between work and the personal life of employees is seldom a matter of serious concern for many employers.
For the latter, what the employee does or happens to him or her after work hours is none of the employer’s business as long as he or she regularly reports for work and completes his or her assigned tasks.
Often, the need to balance professional and personal commitments becomes an issue only if, for example, key staff members fail to report for work for an extended period of time, or the quality of their work deteriorates due to, say, marital problems.
If the employer recognizes the need for that balance and acts to achieve it, fine; if it is not inclined to do so due to financial constraints, the employee would be on his or her own.
It has been said that when one is young, he or she uses his or her health to create wealth, thereafter that wealth may have to be used to recover his or her health.